There are now doubts among allied countries regarding Washington's ability to keep its secrets, the newspaper said on Saturday, adding that the United States appears to be spying not only on Ukraine, but also such important American allies as Israel and South Korea.
According to US officials, the US Federal Bureau of Investigation (FBI) started an inquiry into the source of the leaks on Friday, the newspaper said. One senior US official told The New York Times that the leak was a "massive intelligence breach."
The leaked documents appear to be legitimate intelligence, but at least one of the documents had been modified from its original, officials said.
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A batch of classified US documents on Ukraine that appeared on social media has already marred Washington’s relations with its allies and could hurt diplomatic ties between the countries, the New York Times reported on Saturday.
ReplyDelete"The leak has already complicated relations with allied countries and raised doubts about America’s ability to keep its secrets," the newspaper writes. A senior Western intelligence official, who had reviewed the documents, said the release of the material was "painful" and could "curb intelligence sharing."
"The documents could also hurt diplomatic ties in other ways," according to the article. "The newly revealed intelligence documents also make plain that the United States is not spying just on Russia, but also on its allies."
Senior US officials acknowledged that the documents "appear to be legitimate intelligence and operational briefs compiled by the Pentagon’s Joint Staff," the NYT publication reveals. A senior US official said that it could be difficult to track down the original source of the leak because hundreds, if not thousands, of military and other US government officials have access to such documents. According to the official, the Pentagon had recently instituted procedures to block the distribution of highly sensitive documents.